so i notice a lot of my neighbors are tossing their (non-carved) pumpkins that still seem to be hard and in good shape..some are the regular orange ones, some are beige and green heirlooms..which ones can i eat?

we got some green heirlooms this year but are still using them for decoration, so that's why i'm asking about the neighbors'. there's about 20 of them out in the garbage piles today along the street...

if you keep them in your basement, get a few cooling racks and put some foil or a trashbag on the ground or whatever surface you'll be putting them on, then the racks and then the pumpkins. i made the mistake of storing a bunch of pumpkins directly on a wooden rack in my basement, and the majority of them got moldy from the bottom up. bleh. i am assuming they just need the air circulation to last a little longer.

if you keep them in your basement, get a few cooling racks and put some foil or a trashbag on the ground or whatever surface you'll be putting them on, then the racks and then the pumpkins. i made the mistake of storing a bunch of pumpkins directly on a wooden rack in my basement, and the majority of them got moldy from the bottom up. bleh. i am assuming they just need the air circulation to last a little longer.

Yes! I had one of the small pumpkins that we grew this year in my living room and it rotted out at the bottom just from sitting on the floor. If they are outside they will do much better or in a really cold area of the house and they need to be rotated if you aren't going to do the above. The longer they sit on one side without movement the quicker they will rot. But I'm all for making your own pumpkin puree and then freezing for use late in a million plus recipes.

I'm sure they'd be fine cooked. With planty things, you can usually tell when they're off by them being white and furry.

However, carving pumpkins tend to taste a bit bland, because they're varieties that are grown for a particular size, colour and shape and not flavour. I'd use some muscavado sugar or something with a strong taste as insurance.

_________________Moon - "This is the best recipe in the history of recipes forever."

i always make doggie treats out of pumpkin. i pack it into those ice tube trays and freeze them. they're each 1 oz, so it makes it super easy to measure for recipes. (or to give to a doggie) either way, win-win. (when she limps a lot, she gets glucosamine mixed in to the pumpkin before freezing.) :-)

I bake or steam squash/pumpkins with the seeds still in, then scrape the seeds & stringy surrounding flesh into my Vitamix with some water and blast away. It totally pulverizes it all, and I use it in soups, bread-making, etc.

_________________Formerly Kaleicious. I still love kale, but no more than lots of other garden greens too! Orach is currently my favorite.